Tectus

Content

Tectus – 1st Boss in “The Arcane Sanctum” (optional)

An ancient embodiment of the chaotic forces that shaped the terrain of Draenor, Tectus has been twisted and enslaved by the maddened Pale Orcs – who themselves barely maintain in control over this imposing force of nature.

Map

List of Abilities

The Living Mountain (Important!)Tectus is unkillable as long as he is under the affects of The Living Mountain.
He will periodically gain more energy, with the rate of gain increasing as he loses health.
The power of the Living Mountain is consumed whenever Tectus channels Tectonic Upheaval, leaving him vulnerable to shattering.

Earthen Pillar (Deadly)Tectus raises an Earthen Pillar from the ground. After several seconds of rumbling, the pillar will erupt from the targeted location, killing any players still standing on it.
Tectus uses this ability when he reaches 25 energy.

Crystalline BarrageTectus creates a cloud of crystalline blades that move towards a targeted player. Players who enter the cloud of crystalline blades suffer 40,464 Physical damage each second they remain in the cloud.

FractureTectus causes a short-lived spike of earth to shoot from the ground, inflicting 91,945 Nature damage to players standing where the spike erupts, and knocking them back.

Tectonic UpheavalTectus unleashes his built up seismic instability in to the earth, creating massive series of earthquakes that each inflict 22,136 Nature damage to all players.
If Tectus health is depleted during Tectonic Upheaval, he will Shatter.

Shard of Tectus

Shard of the Mountain (Important!)Tectus is unkillable as long as he is under the effects of Shard of the Mountain.
He periodically gains energy, with the rate of gain increasing as he loses health.
The power of Shard of the Mountain is consumed whenever Tectus channels Tectonic Upheaval, leaving him vulnerable to shattering.

Mote of Tectus

Mote of the Mountain (Important!)The Motes of Tectus can be killed outright. However, they still gain energy and will cast Tectonic Upheaval upon reaching 100 energy.

Night-Twisted Earthwarper

Gift of Earth (Tank alert)Creates a swirling vortex of earth in an attempt to empower Tectus.
If the vortex reaches Tectus, he will gain 10 stacks of Accretion.
Players may interrupt the vortex – if they do, they will suffer 187,390 Physical damage and are afflicted by Petrification.

Petrification (Tank alert)A player’s skin begins to turn to stone after intercepting Gift of Earth.
A petrified players movement speed is reduced by 2% and Tectus will absorbs their petrification whenever he makes a melee attack against them, granting him stacks of Accretion and healing him.

Earthen FlechettesRaises Earthen Flechettes from the ground, inflicting 128,702 Nature damage to all enemies within a cone in front of the caster.

Night-Twisted Berserker

Raving Assault (Tank alert)The Berserker is afflicted with temporary insanity, forgetting their current target, clearing all threat, and dashing towards a random player.
The Berserker inflicts 54,415 Physical damage to targets caught in the path of the dash.

Healing Strategy

This fight that start somewhat orderly, then rapidly deteriorates into absolute chaos. It is a fun fight for healers, since the chaos adds an extra layer of challenge.

Tectus most characteristic ability is that when he dies, he splits into two replicas of himself that inherent the exact same abilities he normally has. He goes from Tectus, the Living Mountain into 2 Shards of the Mountain. You are fighting Tectus times two, just with a little less HP. It won’t stop there though! If you kill the Shards, the Shards will then split into 4 Motes of the Mountain. If you kill both of the Shards at the same time, that means you have 8 Motes active, doing Tectus abilities times 8. Once the Motes die however, he is completely and irrevocably dead.

Now, let’s deal with the abilities that Tectus does. His first ability is Accretion. This is a constant ability that make him deal 5% more damage per stack. The only way to remove the Accretion stacks is to hit him. Sounds easy? Remember that the same goes for the all Motes of the Mountain, meaning someone should always hit Tectus or Tectus-remnants that are active.

Earthen Pillar indicator

The second ability is Earthen Pillar. This is a large earthen spike that erupts from the ground. It is an instant kill-shot and should always be avoided. It has a very large indicator to show where the pillar will erupt, which makes it easy to avoid. The problem is that the pillar creates an obstacle for line of sight. It takes a long time for these pillars to despawn, which makes it paramount to place them properly. Since Earthen Pillar always target ranged players, ranged should stack close to the wall and slowly rotate around the room, only moving when targeted by Earthen Pillar.

Crystalline Barrage

Crystalline Barrage is another quite worrisome ability. It is a red mist which starts at the boss and then fixates on a random player which it pursues, leaving trails of Crystalline Barrage behind. It always fixates on a ranged player which means that if the fixated player doesn’t move, you’ll have mist in your stacked ranged group, causing immense damage. When a player gets fixated, it should run towards the opposite direction of where everyone else is and kite the red mist away. The easiest tactic is that the ranged group run left to avoid Earthen Pillar and the fixated person run right with the red mist.

Tectus will also create mini earthen pillars, called Fracture. These will not instantly kill you if hit, but it will do high amount of damage. He will do this ability more frequently than Earthen Pillar, so the raid has to be on its toes.

Now for the most important ability Tectus does: Tectonic Upheaval. This ability do high, unavoidable damage to the entire raid. You will have to save your healing cooldowns for this ability, since the damage spikes over a longer period of time. The important part of this ability is that Tectus can only be killed or split into shards/motes during this ability! DPS should save their cooldowns for Upheaval and burst him down, because they won’t be able to kill him otherwise. If DPS fail, the raid has to wait for the next upheaval which will prolong the fight immensely.

All Shards and Motes of the mountain have these abilities, meaning you could have theoretically 8 Tectonic Upheavals at the same time. This is why DPS should time the kills as best as possible. The easiest is to burst down one of the Shards and then deal with 4 Motes. Leave the other Shard until the Motes are dead, then go on the second Shard and the last 4 Motes.

Tectus will also summon adds that have some important abilities. There are the Night-Twisted Berserkers, which enrage and forget their current target and will start hitting people in the raid. These should be cleaved down, and when they reset the aggro table, tanks should re-taunt them. There are also the Night-Twisted Earthwarper. Earthwarpers do a frontal cone which should naturally not be directed towards the raid, but they should be standing close to the melee and be cleaved down.

The most dangerous ability Earthwarpers do are Gift of Earth. Gift of Earth is a vortex that travel towards Tectus, and if it reaches him he will gain stacks of Accretion. It can be intercepted by having a player running through it, but it causes high damage and a debuff called Petrification. If a player is hit by Tectus melee attacks while having this debuff active, Tectus will gain stacks of Accretion and be healed. It is also possible to interrupt this ability, which will also cause high damage. There are therefor some options on how to handle it:

Let the vortex reach Tectus; causing him to gain stacks of Accretion.

Having the off-tank intercept it, which will cause high damage and the off-tank can’t be hit by Tectus with the Petrification debuff active (otherwise Tectus will gain stacks of Accretion and will be healed).

Interrupt Gift of Earth cast, causing high damage.

During this fight, tanks will take immense damage. The danger is that tanks stand too far away from healers, since they will run around and pick up adds while healers are stationary in the ranged group. Tanks should be really alert to where the healers are standing.

Melee DPS who are not aware of where ranged are standing will most likely take a hit from Crystalline Barrage, which spawns on the boss and travel towards a fixated ranged player. Other players who are not paying attention could take spikey damage from both Crystalline Barrage and Fracture. Players who stand in Earthen Pillar will die instantly.

For healers it is a fairly simple fight until the Motes are up. Then the raid will spread more and it will be every man for himself. During this part of the fight, healers have to watch out for all of Tectus attacks while trying to reach players in need. During Tectonic Upheaval, healers should rotate the big healing cooldowns. Just don’t use Revival too soon in the channel, since it’ll be more incoming damage until Tectonic Upheaval is done.

Chaos! Every man for himself!

Serpent Tactics

Avoid Earthen Pillar.

Avoid Fracture.

Kite Crystalline Barrage away from the raid.

Don’t stand in front of Night-Twisted Earthwarper, since they do a high damaging frontal cone.

Tanks will take high damage.

The raid will take high damage during Tectonic Upheaval.

When Motes are up, it’ll be every man for himself and healers have to seek the players who are in most need of healing.

Crane Tactics (optional)

Don’t stand in front of the adds.

Watch out for Crystalline Barrage, which will spawn at the boss and travel towards a random ranged player.